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If you live in tornado alley, you not only respect these hulking beasts, you also get used to them. When the siren blows, you might not run right to the shelter, but you keep an eye out. While you can't live in fear for half a year during the season, being lulled into a false sense of security can be very, very dangerous. In Jennifer Brown's Torn Away, the lives of so many were changed forever with the presence of more than just a funnel cloud... it was like the finger of God himself.
Jersey Cameron grew up knowing what to do in the event of a tornado; its just that she never really had to do it. Occasionally, the family would go to the basement, but most of the time the sirens were a false alarm. So it got easier and easier to ignore them. She gets home and starts a meal like any other normal day while her mother takes her sister to dance class, but there is nothing normal about this day. This is the day that they never saw coming and will never be able to forget.
When Jersey realizes the tornado warning is real this time, she turns dinner off and heads to the basement. Hiding down there, she quickly realizes the tornado is bigger than anyone thought. By the time it is over, she leaves the basement to see that her entire house is almost gone. Her neighborhood is almost gone. Her neighbors, and everyone around her, are either injured, or even dead. If her neighborhood is this bad, how could her mother and sister have survived? All alone, Jersey realizes just how destructive the tornado really was.
This book starts with the destruction of a tornado, but it continues down the road of a young girl's dysfunctional family. Her mother never spoke to her own parents, and so Jersey is sent to live with her father whom she has never met. When she gets there, it is clear these people just don't give a crap about Jersey or anything she has gone through. While the premise of the book is the tornado, the continuation of the story really gets to the heart of the aftermath of such a tragedy. It was a really amazing and heartbreaking journey for both Jersey and the reader. Here was a normal girl in a normal midwest life who had everything she ever knew or loved sucked up into a funnel cloud. What is left is damaged beyond all repair... or is it.
This is a book about family, about healing, and also about grieving. I think pegging this book as a "storm book" doesn't really get to the heart of Brown's purpose for the story. If it was a storm book, it would have ended when Jersey was shipped to her dad's house. Instead it kept going, proving Brown had more to say. I have always like Brown's stories, because they aren't afraid to get to the dark and ugly side of things, and Torn Away is no different. I think this story, while dark and sad, would be appropriate for a variety of students. The real-life implications are deep, and a reader will have a hard time not connecting to the story. Jersey is a young woman who was dealt the worst hand possible, yet there is still hope for her with each page you flip.
"Always do what you are afraid to do."
The Have-Nots always assume a life of privilege is easy, happy, carefree. Money buys happiness, right? Or does it lead to more problems? In e. lockhart's We Were Liars, a girl born into privilege experiences the last summer of her innocence, however feigned it may be.
Cadence is coming back Beechwood, her family's private island off the coast of Massachusetts, but this summer will be different from the previous summers. This summer isn't carefree. This summer won't be the same even with The Liars. This summer she is recovering. After her accident where she was found washed up on shore with no memory of what happened and the same night her grandfather's house on the island burned down. Now it has been rebuilt, and her aunts and their families are in their respective houses, and Cadence and her mother have returned to their house, Windmere. The problem is the island is haunted by something deeper and darker than just the burning of a house and a lifetime of memories. Something darker happened, but Cadence can't remember anything from that fateful night.
While her mother obsesses about what Cadence eats and her sleeping habits, Cadence is only interested in the Liars. While she was gone, recovering, she emailed them. Her cousins Johnny and Mirren and Johnny's "stepfather's" nephew, Gat, are the only ones who truly understand the life of a Sinclair. While Gat is technically still (and always will be) an outsider, his summers on the island over the year have given him an insight into their lives that no one else could understand. For Cadence, Gat is the one who could both understand where she comes from and take her away from it all in one fell swoop. Gat is different. But the truth of the night of Cadence's accident hangs over the Liars. As her memories become clearer, she gets closer to the truth and all the nightmares it contains.
They Were Liars, but most importantly, they couldn't lie to themselves. The Liars saw the darkness that lay within the privileged life on Beechwood, and it was controlling their lives. Their mother's and their family had suffered in ways that couldn't be quantified, yet there was an air that they didn't deserve the sympathy, which set the backdrop for this really amazing story. I have to admit that even I struggled for a bit with this wavering sense of pity and envy. You have everything! How could you want more?! But as you got closer and closer to the big twist, it was hard to even put the book down. The book was written in this beautiful, poetic, deep, flowing language that made me feel like I was a wave lapping at the shore of the island. It was quite the tumultuous ride to get to the end of this book because there was so much depth and bittersweet beauty, it was hard not to linger.
When you read this book, be prepared to get bowled over. It takes no hostages. Cadence is a deeply damaged girl who can't dig her way out of the carefully medicated oblivion her accident left her in, and the rest of the family is no better. I think I would give this book to those students who needed something to think about, something to ponder, because they will certainly find it in this novel. It is rich with emotion and devastation that can't be fully explained here, so go out and get a copy. You will understand what I am talking about!
Music is infectious. Music seeps into your soul. And if you are meant to make music, there is nothing that can keep you from making that music, even a pair of unsupportive parents who threaten to take away your college tuition. In Dirty Little Secret by Jennifer Echols, Bailey was born a fiddler and will always be a fiddler. No matter who tries to tell her she can't be.
Bailey and her sister Julie were a team. They worked the bluegrass circuit as a duo and always played to each other's strengths and patched the holes of each other's weaknesses. When a record deal was offered, though, it wasn't for the duo. It was for 16 year old Julie, and 18 year old Bailey was informed that not only would she not get a deal, but the recording company was worried about bad press if people found out Julie's fame came from the destruction of a sister duo, so Bailey was sent to live with her grandfather and ordered to stay away from the music scene. Easier said than done in Nashville. Luckily her grandfather, a maker of string instruments, understands Bailey's need to play and gets her a gig playing back-up fiddle for the traveling bands int he mall. Not glamorous, unless you consider being dressed up as a middle-aged Elvis' back-up singer glamorous, but at least she can play. And she is good at it!
When Bailey is assigned to Johnny Cash (impersonator) and his son, she doesn't expect to find a boy who not only gets her, but also understands her passion for the rockabilly music they all crave. Sam commandeers his father's song and Bailey gets a little taste of his brilliance, both with guitar and his singing. When he convinces her to come play with her band, she is terrified her parents will find out or someone will connect her to Julie if she performs, but Sam is a persuasive guy. When she gets on stage with Charlotte, Ace, and Sam, she knows this band is where she belongs. Unfortunately, Julie's career is more important to her than her own music, and she won't jeopardize Julie. But Sam has other ideas. Not one to take no for an answer, he isn't afraid to lie, cheat, and manipulate to get what he wants, especially if it means he can achieve the success he so desperately craves.
I need to preface this review by saying I have always loved Jennifer Echols' books. They are edgy, no BS, and they appeal to mature YA audiences (or New Adult, if you buy into that subgenre). But this book made me cringe. I loved Bailey, but my hatred for Sam spoiled the entire book for me. Bailey was a sweet girl who got shafted all around: by her parents, by the recording industry, and by Sam... all the time. Everyone used her or discarded her to fit their own needs and no one cared about who Bailey was and what she wanted. And quite frankly, it made me angry to the point of violence against these fictional characters. I don't know why I didn't put the book down, but I can only imagine it was because I figured it had to eventually improve, but I was wrong. Instead, by the end of the book, I was so disgusted by Sam and Bailey's parents that I actually wished I had never read this book. What a poor example for young adult women to be exposed to.
**Spoilers**
First, Bailey was "in trouble" for the car accident she got into with her boyfriend. This was supposed to be the huge thing that led them to tuck her away, BUT they had already told her about the recording deal, taken away her future, cut her off from her sister, and discarded her BEFORE the accident. Then the accident itself wasn't even that awful, at least on her part. She went to a party where she didn't drink or do drugs, got in a car with her boyfriend who she didn't know had done coke, then he crashed into a pond, and finally he tried to manipulate her into taking the fall. Gratefully, Bailey told him to go scratch and told the truth about the wreck, but besides having poor taste in boys, I don't understand how any of this was Her fault, besides the fact that it made her parents have to remember that they had a second daughter- a fact they were happy to forget.
Then her parents. Ugh. They had no problem discarding one daughter for the fame of the other, and Julie's career was what THEY wanted, not Julie. She missed having a real life, but they didn't care. They just threw it in her face that they had made huge sacrifices to get her this far. Even when she refused to go on stage until Bailey came, they blamed Bailey for filling her head with nonsense. Great parents. Really, model parents right here. If Echols' purpose was to make every young adult thankful for the loving, yet inevitably flawed, parents they had, then she succeeded. Otherwise, she just made me appalled by such selfish, self-centered, manipulative parents who should never have been allowed to have children.
And finally, there is Sam. The worst of the worst. Sam is only concerned with his own career, and he is willing to do anything to get it. Including seducing young women to join his band to get them gigs. In fact, even though Charlotte, his bandmate, blows up his spot and tells Bailey that every sweet nothing he whispered to her, he also whispered to Charlotte (verbatim), Sam still manages to paint Charlotte as crazy and jealous... and Bailey BELIEVES him! Ugh! Then, Bailey agrees to play with them as long as there are no videos or other evidence that could be posted somewhere and jeopardize Julie's career. Does Sam care? NOPE! Send it in anyway and then cannot fathom why she would be upset by all this! In fact, he makes her feel like SHE is being selfish. Yep. Real winner there! Then, he makes fun of songwriters, something Bailey is not only good at, but she sees as her only outlet since there is no one in her life she can talk to. What a winner that guy Sam is! And as if that isn't enough... he actually convinces her to go groveling back to her parents SO THEY CAN GET HIM A RECORD DEAL. Before he realized just how serious Julie's career was, he was all, "Oh your parents are horrid! Never speak to them again!" Then he sees Julie's billboard and is like, "What is wrong with you? Your parents can make us famous! Can't you suck up your pride for once to help us?! C'mon! They aren't all that bad! See?! Having connections makes them infallible! Never mind your horrible childhood. I want a record deal!" And you know what she does? First she calls him on this BS... then she sleeps with him. Fabulous. Calling all Young Adult ladies! You worried you might be too strong, too determined, too powerful, and too proud? Don't worry, I've got the book for you! And this one will be sure to make you into the quivering, manipulated, spineless woman we want our next generation to become!!
**End Spoilers**
I hated Sam with a vehemence that doesn't even rival my hatred for Lord Voldemort, because at least the Big LV admitted he was evil, relished in it, even. Sam was billed as an awesome musician who came to sweep her off her feet, and instead he just continued to abuse her like her parents did. I am sorry, but there is no young adult woman I would ever give this book to. It demeans everything we try to teach the amazing young women in our lives: to believe in themselves, to stand up for themselves, and to see through people who would rather use them than love them. This book is truthfully one of the worst examples of young adulthood that I have ever read. Please don't give this to your young ladies. Don't do that to our next generation. Instead give them a book like Graceling or Throne of Glass or Defiance with some real, butt-kickin', take no prisoners kind of ladies. Trust me. We don't want to encourage our young women to become the Baileys of the world. Sorry, Ms. Echols. You might have ruined me forever from your books with this one.
When you hear Alice in Zombieland, one would assume there was going to be either some Wonderland riffs, some brain eating zombies, or, better yet, an amalgamation of both! But with Gena Showalter's first book in the White Rabbit Chronicles, you shouldn't make any assumptions.
Alice and her sister are used to their father's crazy paranoia, but it doesn't mean they like it. Never allowed out at night, forced to live like shut-ins except for school, all of it makes for a very difficult childhood, especially when you know he is just plain crazy. But when a car accident kills Alice's father, mother, and sister, she is the only one alive in the car and the only witness to the creatures that crept through the darkness to rip them apart and eat them.
Shipped off to her grandparents' house, Alice encounters a very secretive group of kids. She is intrigued by them even though there is every reason to stay away from them. But when she is attacked, it becomes clear there is something dark and disturbing out there, and that group of kids are somehow connected. The answers are heavily protected, but Alice is determined to find out what the things are that killed her family, especially since now they seem to be after her.
Did you ever watch a movie after seeing the trailer for months that portrayed a hilarious comedy only to find out the movie was completely depressing? Do you remember that feeling of being cheated? Well, welcome to my experience with Alice in Zombieland. I would have been fine with no actual references to Alice in Wonderland if there were real zombies, but instead, the "zombies" are absolutely nothing like zombies. No resemblance save for death. Instead, they are more like malevolent spirits which feed and infect your soul with their malevolence, turning you into your own dead malevolent spirit. In fact, they are afraid of light, only come out at night, must be battled while the hunter is in spirit form, and are killed by a super-strong light a hunter emits from their hand over the "zombie's" heart. Sound like any zombie you have heard about? I didn't think so. So why would you even call them zombies and get my hopes up?!
I have no idea, but sadly, that ruined this book for me. It could have been halfway decent if I wasn't expecting something completely different. Instead I was terribly disappointed and struggled to finish the book. So, I am torn about reading the second in the series because it had potential, but I was so annoyed by the whole zombie debacle. I did, however, LOVE the grandparents who took Alice in. They were so wonderful and endearing, and I wished I knew them in real life (especially when they tried to use "hip" language to let her know they were "cool"!). So I will see if I can bring myself to read the next book in the series. Maybe if I forget my disappointment in a little while, I will realize the parts I actually liked were redeeming... but until that happens, I am swirling in my own bitter disappointment over here!
Jordan Sonnenblick has this uncanny ability to take a serious subject, battle the dramatic situation with bittersweet class, and inject the funny that makes such a serious topic digestible. I don't know how he does it, but I keep coming back for more. So when Curveball: The Year I Lost My Grip was released, I knew it was going to hit the ball out of the park (pun intended!).
Peter always assumed he would enter 9th grade with his best friend AJ and their dynamic pitcher/catcher combo would land them on varsity. What he didn't expect that ignoring that clicking pain in his elbow would cause his elbow to actually fall apart and never go back together again. After much surgery and recovery time, Peter gets the life-altering news that his baseball career is over. Just over. He can't bring himself to tell AJ the truth, so he starts spending time with his grandfather over the summer. His grandfather has always been a photographer and has taught Peter a lot over the years. But with all the time he is spending with Grampa leads him to believe something isn't quite right.
Grampa is forgetting things and spacing out a lot. Peter tries to talk to his mother about it, but she doesn't want to admit anything is wrong. When Grampa gives Peter all his camera, Peter shakes off the feeling that something is really wrong. Without baseball in his life, he needs a new focus and begins to enjoy his new elective: Photography. Of course it doesn't hurt that the only other freshman in the class is a girl Peter finds whole-heartedly intriguing named Angelika. Peter and Angelika begin photographing the sports teams for the school newspaper, but despite his great year at school, something is still tugging on Peter's conscience about his grandfather. But will anyone realize how bad it has gotten before it is too late?
Oh, dear, dear Sonnenblick. I don't know how you do it. Life-altering injury combined with Alzheimer's Disease and light-hearted humor? Should be absurd or tactless, right? Well, it isn't. It's beautiful. It is bitter-sweet and realistic and beautiful. All hard situations in life are peppered with a little laughter where you just have to look at how crappy things have gotten and laugh. I remember going to a break out session in a conference about Finding the Funny with LD. In the session, the presenter explained how she got her epileptic brother a dog to lift his spirits after he lost his job and his wife left him. Know what happened next? Her brother's lab had a seizure and was diagnosed with epilepsy. She said she and her brother stood at the vet's office laughing. Because, really, what else can you do at that point? Is the epilepsy funny? Of course not, but the irony of the epileptic dog to make the epileptic brother feel better is so bitter you just have to laugh at the situation. This story always reminds me of Sonnenblick. He knows the fine balance between lightening up a sad situation with some witty remarks and situation irony and the tacky fun-poking at a serious topic. And with Sonnenblick, it is never tacky.
He creates a story where Peter is suffering his own life-altering trauma, but in the midst of healing and moving on with his life, he must acknowledge that the man who has always been such a huge part of Peter's life has irrevocably changed. This seems like a double whammy, and by gods it is. This is also a beautifully handled story about a family fighting the knowledge that their father/grandfather is suffering from an incurable disease, a disease that always tends to be harder on the family than the victim itself. When Grampa starts to forget things and space out, nobody wants to admit aloud when they are pretty sure is happening. They ignore the signs or explain them away until they find themselves in a situation where their loved one could seriously hurt themselves. As a granddaughter and great-granddaughter, I have experienced this denial first hand. It isn't neglectful, it is actually steeped in unconditional love where you can't imagine the strong family member you know and love slipping away. Peter and his family are the embodiment of this struggle, and it was written beautifully.
This is a book for a wide variety of students from early middle readers through high school students, because while the language is simple, the story has layers of depth that would appeal to a wide range of students. It is beautifully written, just as all Sonnenblick's books are. I also love how the inclusion of baseball might draw in a boy reader to enjoy a story that is so much more than just a sports story. But sometimes you just need the hook to get them in. And the characters are all wonderful, brilliantly developed, and easily relatable. You will finish this book and be as blown away as I was. Bravo, Mr. Sonnenblick. You have done it again!
Everyone thinks of their grandparents as those innocuous, cookie making, gray haired oldies who always make you feel better when things aren't going well. But what if your grandmother or grandfather had a dark past? And what if that dark past is coming to the surface now that they are suffering from dementia? In Chris Lynch's short novel Kill Switch, he explores just such a terrifying issue.
Daniel is going off to college in the fall, so he wants to spend as much time with his grandfather, Da, as possible. Da's Alzheimer's or dementia makes their "quality time" less quality and more spotty. Still, Daniel has always had a soft spot for Da and is willing to cope with his bad moments for those few, brief, clear moments. When Da starts saying weird things, Daniel just attributes them to the dementia, but the arrival of his past coworkers tips Daniel off to the fact that Da may not have worked in the government's agriculture department as he previously told them.
With Da more agitated than usual, Da, Daniel, and Daniel's stoner cousin Jarrod take off on a road trip to nowhere. They have no destination and no real purpose, but Da seems to think they are being followed, so they continue on. Meanwhile their family is home fretting about their whereabouts. But when the trip hits some strange snags, they worry that Da might be right about his past, and they might be in real danger. But the worst danger might be that Daniel has the ability to follow right in Da's footsteps.
A novella or short novel is a funny thing. It is significantly short than most novels (under 200 pages), but longer than a short story. It has the need to be clear, quick, and concise like a short story, but it has a little more wiggle room like a novel. Still, a short novel has to be pretty lucid in order to accomplish what larger novels do in 400-500 pages. Chris Lynch is usually a master at this, but sadly, he failed miserably with this novel for me. I was stoked to read this book; I mean, the premise is just awesome! But in execution? It really didn't work. The writing was first person narrative, which I usually enjoy, but it was very... how do I put this... nebulous? It was unclear and unfocused and shifted too quickly without any transitions. I found myself flipping back a lot because I missed things despite usually being an attentive and careful reader. It wasn't me, though; it was the strange way tis book was written.
Writing style aside (and mind you, this is not the usual style Lynch writes in, at least from the books I have read), the characters weren't important enough to me either. You had a young boy who loved his Alzheimer's patient grandfather... you want to love this kid, right? Nope. He was odd, punchy, and there was something to him I didn't like that I still haven't been able to put my finger on. The cousin Jarrod was just a putz, but the way they treated him was strange and grating at times. Then comes Da, who you should have sympathized for, and you did... sometimes. The rest of the time I found myself wondering what the hell was going on, and by the time I figured it out, I didn't care anymore.
I am sad to say I wouldn't really recommend this book to my students. I think they would get too lost in the strange storytelling to get anything out of the book, which is frustrating to any reader (including myself). I am sad and surprised to see this caliber of book from Lynch. Usually he nails the short novel and I love them for my emergent, older readers who need a short but fascinating book. maybe next time, Chris Lynch. Maybe next time.
We all love(d) picture books, right? The pictures were what lured us in and started us reading. So wouldn't it be ingenious to create an amazing story full of quirky old photographs that pulled a struggling reader in with the images and held them with the rocking story? Well, Ransom Riggs did just that with Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children.
Jacob grew up listening to his grandfather's wild stories about girls who floated, an invisible boy, a fire starter, and the orphanage they all lived in run by "a bird who smoked a pipe". When he was young, these stories were addictive, along with the photos that accompanied them. Once he got older, though, he became skeptical and eventually confronted his grandfather about their authenticity. When Jacob's grandfather is found brutally murdered, Jacob loses it. He pulls away from everyone and everything, and his parents make him see a therapist. With the therapist's encouragement, Jacob and his father finally set off to find the orphanage his grandfather escaped to as his Jewish family was being herded into concentration camps.
Once they arrive on the remote island in Wales, they realize it is a strange place- almost stuck in time. When Jacob finds the orphanage, his dreams are immediately destroyed with the rotting corpse of the building. But then he spies some kids- the same kids from his grandfather's photos. They take him back to the orphanage- or at least exactly how it was in 1940. The orphanage they live in is in a time loop created by Miss Peregrine, the head lady of the orphanage who can shift into a bird and protects the "peculiar" children. The children have been living for decades in the loop, and Jacob's arrival is very exciting. But when it becomes clear the peculiars are in trouble, Jacob is will to risk everything to protect them, especially Emma, the girl who once loved her grandfather. But how can a normal, boring human help the peculiars? Maybe he isn't so "normal"!
The best way to describe this book is "peculiar". It is comforting, yet strange and different. The photos aren't the only oddities of this story, the characters, concept, and execution are strange too, but strange in an amazing, whirlwind way. Without the photos, the story still wouldn't be your average "supernatural" or "paranormal" story we see so much of today. It is a truly novel concept and execution and I couldn't get enough of it.
The writing, story, and characters are all appropriate for a wide range of students. The photos will captivate a younger or lower-skilled student and keep them turning the pages, but the story is sophisticated enough to keep a stronger or older reader hooked as well. I can see the quirky students loving this book, but the less "peculiar" students also being sucked into the interesting story. Truly, this is one of those magical books that might end up as my "go to" independent reading story for most kids. I have a few of them, my reliable all stars that work for so many students. I predict this book will soon be added to this illustrious list! Add it to your libraries and classroom shelves... you won't be sorry!
